Taken separately, CRM and Email Marketing are each vital marketing tools. But, when tied together, they create a powerful sales and marketing tool that provides an integrated, cost-effective approach for maintaining customer loyalty and generating new sales leads.

There is an excellent, you-don’t-want-to-miss post on the Business Black Belt blog, titled How CRM and Email Marketing Can Help Grow Your Small Business which covers some of the most significant benefits that result from combining these two important tools. Although, the title refers to “small business”, I believe the article is applicable to any size business.

Some of the most important benefits cited are:

Helps Keep Track Of Leads And Customers – A growing business has a large number of new leads, as well as current and past customers. Often, Excel and paper-based solutions are difficult to manage and it’s easy to let opportunities and contacts slip through the cracks. A CRM system allows the user to keep track of this information in an organized and proactive manner. Integrate your email marketing system for even better results.

Convert Leads To Customers – A CRM system when used properly will help ensure that every lead is properly moved through the sales funnel. From first contact to the sale and beyond, a CRM system will optimize a business’ established sales processes. Most systems can be customized to fit the specific needs of a business.

Build Customer Loyalty – The often-cited statistic is that it costs five times more to acquire a new customer than to retain an existing one. CRM and email marketing systems help to build loyalty by staying in constant contact with prospects, customers, and other key stakeholders.

Keep Customers Up-To-Date For Top-Of-Mind Awareness – With many companies competing for the same customer, it is important that it is your company or your brand that has top-of-mind awareness. New offers and important news are two items that companies can use to generate more awareness and increase sales. CRM and email marketing done right will improve brand awareness by keeping customers updated when the information can be most valuable.

Cross-Sell And Up-Sell – Every customer has the potential to buy more of the same product or buy another product you sell. CRM and email marketing solutions help to identify and act on cross-selling and up-selling opportunities to increase your revenues.

For those of you who already have a CRM system but are considering adding an email marketing system, I hope this helps. For those of you who have neither, I hope this also helps.

Last, but not least, for those of you who are using Microsoft Dynamics CRM, I invite you to review CRM2Emails here.